Punisher War Journal #20 Review

Jigsaw's back to menace Frank Castle.

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I feel like I'm about to give Punisher: War Journal #20 the same criticism I gave the last issue: it's not that it's bad, it's just overwhelmingly inconsistent. Some moments are pretty good and some just give me a headache. As far as I'm concerned, the only thing more infuriating than a bad book is a mediocre book that shows brief flashes of competence.

Let's start with the good. This arc is called "Jigsaw," and the villain's all-too-brief scene suggests that Matt Fraction and/or Rick Remender have a solid handle on him. His idiosyncratic speech could have easily been annoying, but it comes off more unique. There's also G. W. Bridge's femmes fatale, who become a shade more rounded as a unit this issue, as opposed to just a buxom, imposing force who just sort of stands there and promises to bring the hurt sometime later.

Elsewhere, things aren't so nice. Howard Chaykin's art is roughly the same as always, it's just the subject matter that trips it up here. Domino & Co. aren't exactly the prettiest picture to look at. It seems like a Punisher book that features only Frank and some random supporting characters plays more to Chaykin's strengths – a story where he's forced to play with the larger Marvel Universe doesn't work quite as well.

There's also the inclusion of the Hand, which drives the second half of the issue completely into left field and features, of all things, Frank Castle wielding a katana for a large part of the sequence. The conflation of the Japanese and Punisher worlds strikes me as sort of odd, but could work in the right circumstances. This isn't one of them. It's used for no apparent reason and isn't used to say anything interesting about either concept. The Hand feels bolted on with no attempt made to integrate it to the larger package.

A very odd issue, and not one I can really recommend enthusiastically. That seems to be a trend with this book, unfortunately.